


The Odd Ones Out

by boombangbing



Series: Direction [8]
Category: The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Casual Sex, Drunk Sex, F/M, One Night Stands
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-02
Updated: 2013-04-02
Packaged: 2017-12-07 06:28:39
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,759
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/745359
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/boombangbing/pseuds/boombangbing
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bruce and Jane get drunk and sleep with each other after Darcy and Steve’s wedding. It’s super awkward afterwards, but they get over it.<br/>(This fic takes place in chapters seven, eight and eleven of <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/works/563341/chapters/1043710">Never Read the Comments</a>.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Odd Ones Out

**Author's Note:**

> By popular demand: Bruce and Jane bone.

Tony's workshop is like Wonderland.

“Candyland,” Bruce murmurs, and Tony laughs. Jane is too caught up in looking at a holographic projection of the solar system to ask.

She sort of... forgets about Darcy for a while, as she playing with all the toys. In her defence, Darcy and Steve disappear off together for most of the day, and don't seem to need any assistance. When they skulk back into the living area in the early evening for pizza, they both look a little rumpled and Steve's blush pretty much gives the game away.

Darcy, characteristically, complains about the mushrooms on the pizza and piles them onto Steve's slices as they banter cutely.

Bruce looks at them from over the top of his beer bottle, smiling slightly. He's such an unassuming character, but judging by the few hours they spent in Tony's workshop, his mind is even more brilliant than she'd already thought. She just wants to sit down and pick it apart. 

But in a less creepy sounding way.

“You know, it's bad luck to see the bride the day before the wedding,” Tony says speculatively, “So I guess you're already fucked, actually.”

Steve looks from his pizza. “Thanks?”

“It's just an observation.”

Pepper elbows him. “Don't observe.”

Tony hunches down even further into the couch, taking a sip of his beer. “Yes, dear,” he murmurs.

Bruce snorts and looks over at Jane. “I feel like we're the odd ones out,” he says, and it's true. The four of them are being all cute and couple-y, and here Jane and Bruce are, sitting on opposite ends of a couch, like single losers at a high school party where everyone's pairing off. Which is a status that Jane is not altogether unfamiliar with.

She laughs and salutes him with her beer bottle.

-

They spend most of the night in Tony's workshop again. Tony's been working on a new Iron Man suit, one capable of at least leaving the atmosphere, if not full blown interstellar travel. Jane has a lot of thoughts about, which all come out in one big, semi-coherent mess.

“You're adorable,” Tony says, “isn't she adorable, Bruce?”

Bruce nods from his spot sitting on one of Tony's work stations, his feet a good five inches off the ground. “You're pretty cute,” he says, and smiles.

“You're pretty cute too,” she says, and he raises his eyebrows at her. She feels a blush warm her face, so she turns back to Tony's hologram and clears her throat. “I don't think that this part is going to work...”

It's invigorating working with them. Which isn't to say that Erik isn't intellectually stimulating company, but these guys are new and unpredictable, especially in Tony's case, and totally willing to accept Jane's more out there theories without pulling the kinds of faces that Erik so often pulls.

They don't have quite the stamina for all nighters that Jane has, though.

Tony yawns, stretching his arms over his head. His t-shirt rides up a couple of inches to reveal his surprisingly narrow waist – he's not quite on the level of Steve, but he's getting there. She checks it out appreciatively.

“Well, I'm going to hit the hay for a couple of hours,” he says, scratching the back of his head. “Still can't believe that Stevie's really getting married.”

“Yeah...” she says. “Should we, uh... wake him?” she adds, nodding to where Bruce has fallen asleep in a chair, his chin to his chest.

“You wanna awake the sleeping giant?” Tony shakes his head. “Let Jarvis do it in a couple of hours.”

She shrugs. “Okay.”

Tony yawns again, covering his face with his hands, and she snorts. “One day you'll be as old as I am, Foster, then it won't be so funny,” he says. He tugs his pants up a couple of inches and turns towards the stairs. “See you in the morning, don't do anything I wouldn't do.”

“That leaves me pretty open, I think,” she says.

“Ah, I set you up for that one,” Tony says, and flashes her a bright white smile as he leaves.

-

It's not that Jane doesn't approve of Darcy and Steve dating, or even them getting married. Obviously there's no better man to marry than Steve, and against what she thought were some pretty high odds, Steve didn't run screaming from Darcy. It's just so _soon_. They've known each other, what, a few months? Jane knows that Darcy isn't particularly interested in kids, and they're already living, and sleeping, together, so Jane just doesn't get it. Then again, she rarely 'gets' Darcy, so she supposes that there's nothing new there.

But Darcy's doing it with or without Jane's approval, and she does look extremely pretty in the dress they picked up at a thrift store two days ago ( _two_ days, seriously, this is crazy). Steve doesn't look bad in his suit, either. Or his dress pants and shirt, at least, because ties, bowties, and fancy shoes are absent, and for possibly the first time, Jane sees Steve the twenty seven year old, and thinks that maybe this is the man that Darcy has fallen in love with – not a superhero, or an old man, or a soldier with PTSD, but just a cute guy who's able to make almost everyone there cry. Even Tony blinks hard several times, and keeps shooting glances at Pepper.

It's all over pretty quickly after that, Darcy and Steve run off upstairs to get their suitcases, and stay up there longer than Jane thinks that packing a suitcase really takes.

Pepper puts Steve and Darcy in one car, and Darcy's parents in another, and then summons a third for her and Tony.

“Well, we've gotta get going to San Fran,” Tony says. “You guys can come with, or we can take you somewhere, or...” He shrugs.

“Don't call it 'San Fran',” Pepper says absently, tapping at her phone.

“I should really be getting back to New York,” Jane says, and Bruce nods.

“Yeah, me too.”

Tony shrugs. “Fine, go, leave me. We'll drop you off at the airport.”

-

Being the only two people on a great big plane is kind of weird. For the first hour or so, they sit at opposite ends of the cabin, each tapping away on their laptops. After a while, though, Bruce starts pacing, and Jane watches him out of the corner of her eye as he looks in the various cabinets dotted around the place. Finally he stops at one and raises his eyebrows.

“There is a lot of alcohol in here,” he says.

“Yeah?”

He nods. “Yeah... You want a drink?”

-

“...and it's not like I'm _jealous_ ,” Jane finds herself saying later, sprawled out on a couch beside Bruce.

“Sure,” he says.

“It's just that... you know...” She takes another drink from the bottle of wine that they liberated and hands it back to Bruce. “They are way too young, she's not even _twenty five_ yet. When I was twenty five, I was a PhD candidate and... and... I did not have sex on tap from six two blond _superhero_.” She slouches down into the couch and groans. “God, I'm so frustrated!”

Bruce sniggers a little, offering the bottle back.

“Don't laugh at me!” she says, snatching up the bottle. “And do you know what else annoys me?”

“I think you're going to tell me...” Bruce murmurs.

She narrows her eyes and him and takes another drink. “There was no _dancing_. When I go to a wedding, I expect there to be dancing. It's the only time I get the chance, and Darcy denied me it!”

“You like dancing?”

“At weddings I do! I didn't go to my junior or senior proms, so I never got to do all of that, and I like wearing dresses sometimes, you know? I look okay in a dress.”

“You do,” he says.

She feels herself blush a little. “Thank you,” she murmurs, as she puts the bottle down on the floor.

He smiles. “I didn't go to prom either.”

“I mean, prom probably sucks,” Jane continues, “I'm not _scarred_ from not going, or anything, I just would have liked to dance.”

Bruce nods. “Wanna dance now?”

“And I mean-- wait, what?”

He shrugs. “If you want to dance, we can dance. I don't really know _how_ to dance, but I can try...”

“Well...” She feels a little flustered, like she always does when men flirt with her. But is he even flirting with her? He's so quiet, she can barely tell, and, well, he probably _isn't_ because doesn't he have a girlfriend already? Well, an ex, but from what she's heard, it's pretty unresolved, and...

“Jane?” he asks, frowning a little. “Uh, don't worry about it, it was probably a stupid idea anyway...”

“No!” she says, and he starts a little at her forcefulness. Oh dear, she really shouldn't drink around cute guys. “No, I mean, yes, yes, we can dance.”

One corner of his mouth tips up. “Okay.”

He stands up, and offers his hand to her. She, of course, feels all flustered and drunkenly uncoordinated and stumbles into him. He stumbles back a bit too, but manages to keep the two of them upright, his hands wrapped around her arms. She's pretty sure that her face is bright fucking red right now.

“Music?” she asks.

“Music?” he repeats. “Oh, uh...”

“Perhaps I may be of assistance?” Jarvis's voice cuts in.

“Jarvis?” Bruce asks. “I didn't know that you were... here.”

“Sir, I am everywhere. Perhaps some Marvin Gaye?” he suggests.

 _Let's Get It On_ starts playing and Bruce pulls a face. “Are you kidding...” he murmurs.

“I don't mind this song,” she says.

“Oh... okay,” he says, “well then, let's... dance.”

It takes them a couple of minutes to get to grips with each other, but they eventually settle with Bruce's arm around her waist and their hands clasped together. Bruce shuffles his feet a little and laughs.

“I _really_ don't know how to dance,” he confesses.

“Me either,” she says. “Although I can do the Macarena.”

He grins. “I can do the Thriller dance.”

“Really?”

He nods, watching their feet closely. “Yeah. I'm not doing it now, though.”

“Aw, please?”

“Nope. I'm drunk, I'll fall on my face.”

“Okay, okay,” she says. 

They shuffle around for a little longer, smiling awkwardly at each other every now and then. She's not really sure where to look, so she switches from looking at the floor, to over his shoulder, to studying the collar of his shirt. Finally she looks up at him and clears her throat. “It's nice how I don't have to crane my head back,” she blurts out. “Every guy I've danced with before has been, like, a foot taller than me.”

Bruce nods. “That's a really nice way of saying I'm short...”

“Oh! I didn't mean it like that, I just meant...”

“I know,” he says softly, eyes lingering on her face.

She bites her lip. Crap. Crap, crap, _crap_ , she thinks to herself, as she leans up and he leans down and then they're kissing, and not just kissing, but _kissing_ , with her hands in his hair, and his arms pulling her up against him. She tries to hook one of her legs around his hip and just succeeds in tripping both of them over. Thankfully they haven't moved too far away from the couch, so Bruce just falls back against it, tugging her down with him.

“Wanna have sex?” he murmurs, as she shifts around in his lap. She's caught between the desire to straddle him, and knowledge that she should really get up right now and drink about a gallon of water to sober up.

“So you were flirting with me,” she says, half sitting on his knee.

“Trying to,” he says, and raises his eyebrows.

“Oh, well...” She pushes back her hair and clears her throat. “We're drunk.”

“We are,” he agrees. “I'm not that drunk, though. What about you?”

“Well, I'm not... I'll still remember this in the morning.”

“Maybe that's the problem?” Bruce says, then shakes his head. “Sorry, I'm not trying to...”

“I mean, it wouldn't mean anything, right?” Jane asks. “It'd just be... sex for the sake of having sex?” God, does she want some sex right about now.

“Totally meaningless,” Bruce murmurs. “Just two... awkward scientists helping each other out.”

Jane laughs. “Okay. Condoms?”

“Um...” Bruce shifts a little, and her attention is drawn to his crotch – okay, Dr Banner's definitely not lacking in _that_ area. “I don't have any condoms,” he says. “I wasn't expecting to... you know.”

“This is _Tony Stark's_ plane,” Jane says, “there must be some around here... Jarvis?”

“On the bottom shelf of the liquor cabinet,” Jarvis directs.

She stumbles over to the cabinet and finds a whole box full of condoms beside a collection of cocktail glasses. She stares at them for a moment, trying to keep herself together, but she still ends up bursting into a helpless giggle fit.

“Jane?” Bruce calls. “Is everything okay?”

She shakes her head to clear it, and stands up. “Fine, I'm fine.” Bruce is still sprawled out against the couch where he fell back, and she feels particularly bold as she tosses a condom at him. “Get that on.”

He grins as it lands on his chest, and struggles for a second to sit up.

Are they really going to do this? Is she really about to get undressed in front of a man she met less than forty eight hours ago? Is he really going to be able to get his pants off?

“Do you need any help?” she asks as he struggles with his belt. He's successfully shed his shirt, though, and she takes a second to admire his rather nice chest.

“Uh...” He chuckles. “I'm getting there.”

She nods, and gives into the urge to turn around when she takes her t-shirt and pants off. What good it'll do, she doesn't know, since he'll have to see her naked in a couple of minutes if they're going to do this whole sex thing, but she allows herself that moment's self-consciousness.

At least she chose underwear that don't have holes in them this time. She takes a breath and pushes the straps of her sports bra off her shoulders: last time she got undressed in front of a guy, he commented that he hadn't realised that her breasts were quite _that_ small. She grabs the bottle of wine off the floor and takes a pull for courage.

She turns back to Bruce, and finds his pants in a puddle on the floor, and him rolling the condom on. His previous bulge _definitely_ wasn't deceptive. It's the least she can do to pull her bra off in front of him. He looks at her for moment, his eyes skittering awkwardly over her body.

“You're really pretty,” he says.

“Oh...” she says, looking down at herself. “Thank you. You're very... handsome, too.”

He smiles. “Are we going to...?” he asks, fidgeting with his hands a little.

“Yes,” she says, “we're having sex.”

He scoots back on the frankly enormous couch, and watches her as she climbs on after him. She supposes that it's kind of gross to have sex in someone else's couch, but she decides that she is far too drunk to worry about that.

She sits in front of him for a moment, and they just stare at each a little more before she makes the executive decision to lean forward and kiss him.

It should be awkward, and embarrassing, and just an all round slightly disappointing time like she usually has, but she guesses that they're both just drunk enough and just sexually frustrated enough that everything flows pretty easily. 

Bruce rolls them so that he's half on top, and he really is one hell of a kisser. She gets a little lost in it all, his hands on her skin, his teeth scraping against her lips, his hips rolling against hers, over and over and over, until she's fairly sure she could come just from this if she put her mind to it. Bruce is making funny little grunting noises, almost growling, and it's hot for sure, but also possibly a little worrying...

“Uh,” she huffs, “you're not going to... uh... Are you?”

He groans, hips still working against hers. “At some point, I hope,” he pants.

She feels herself flush. “I meant...”

“Oh, _oh_ , no, I'm not gonna... go green,” he says, pulling back to look at her. “Are you okay, do you still want to do this?”

“I...” She bites her lip and looks up at him. If they don't have sex pretty soon, she's going to be feeling very cranky later on. “Yeah, I do.” She reaches down and tugs her underwear off, then snakes her fingers around his erection, angling it.

“ _Oh_ ,” he groans, pressing into her, “okay.”

The rhythm he sets is a little uneven, but it's still good, and a _lot_ better than she's had in a while. She pants against his neck and winds her fingers into his hair, which he seems to like, judging by how he presses his mouth to her jaw and bites lightly. “Is this okay?” he mumbles.

“Yeah, yeah,” she says breathlessly, “maybe just... a little... faster?”

He groans in agreement, leaning back up to kiss her again, his hips picking up speed.

She wraps her legs around his waist, and meets his thrusts, pushing a hand between their bodies to rub at her clit. Bruce's thrusts burn a little, she isn't quite wet enough, honestly, but it's not bad; it's a lot better than Don could ever muster.

Bruce breaks the kiss to bury his face in her neck. “I'm gonna...” he murmurs, sounding a little strangled.

“Yeah,” she gasps, “me too.”

Bruce comes with a funny little whimper and huff, his head still bowed against her neck. She rubs at her clit double time until she follows him, digging the fingers of her free hand into his shoulder.

They lie there for a long moment, panting, before Bruce pushes himself up a little, blinking heavily a couple of times. “I should probably... go clean up,” he murmurs.

“Yeah, um... me too,” she says quietly, with none of the confidence she had a few minutes ago. Sex Jane is sultry and at least a little bit self-assured – post sex Jane is the same awkward nerd as ever.

Bruce gets up, pulling out of her with a wet slide that's kind of horribly embarrassing, and grabs his pants and shirt off the floor. He gives her one last awkward smile before he retreats to one of the plane's bathrooms.

She lies on the couch for a few minutes, ruminating on events. Somewhere inside – underneath all the vague embarrassment that she always feels after sex, and the knowledge sinking in that she just had a one night stand with Dr Bruce Banner, unparalleled genius in the field of nuclear physics and _fugitive_ – she feels... satisfied. She hasn't had sex in a couple of years. She always seems to be waiting: waiting to graduate, waiting to get her PhD, waiting to get research positions, waiting for _Thor_. What's the point? Darcy doesn't seem to wait for anything, and she seems a hell of a lot happier than Jane.

What she definitely can't wait for is a wash, she realises as she sits up. _Yuck_.

-

They have another three hours to kill before they get back to New York, which is something Jane didn't really consider in all her drunken wisdom.

“So, um...” she starts, then trails off.

Bruce purses his mouth in a funny little smile and looks at the floor. He really is _very_ cute.

“Yeah,” he murmurs. “I uh... I've never had a... one night stand before...”

“Really?” she asks, and he nods. “I've had... I mean, I've only had a couple...”

“Honestly, I've only ever had sex with one woman,” he adds. “Well, two now, but... I mean, I've had sex more than once before, I just mean that...”

“I know what you mean,” she assures him.

He snorts. “Yeah.”

“Was it Dr Ross?” she asks, wondering if she's crossing a line, but line crossing is something they probably should have thought about earlier.

“Yeah,” he sighs, then frowns. “You don't know her, do you?”

“I met her once at a staff mixer at Culver, but we said about three words total to each other.”

“Okay, good, because that would make things really awkward right now,” he says, with a lop-sided smile.

She chuckles. “Yes, that _would_ make this awkward.”

They slip into companionably awkward silence for a couple of minutes, each looking at their respective portions of the floor before Jane lifts her head.

“You two aren't, uh, together any more, right?” she asks. The absolute last thing she needs is to be a _homewrecker_.

“No, not for a long time,” he says a little sadly. “I'm not... I'm no good for Betty.”

“I'm sure that's not true,” she mumbles, face heating up. What's she even supposed to say right now?

“What about you and Thor?” he asks quietly.

“Oh...” And what is she supposed to say to _that_? “I don't know. I haven't seen him in a couple years. We didn't even... _well_.” She looks at Bruce's bare feet and he chuckles a little. “We weren't – we're not – an item.”

“I'm sorry,” he murmurs.

“It's fine, it's not your fault,” she says.

He picks carefully at his nails. “I know, but... life does stuff. Someone should apologise for it.”

“Well, thanks,” she says. She glances at the clock; they've still got two hours and forty minutes before they land. “Do you want to... go over some work? We could see if Tony's new suit is really feasible or not.”

He shrugs. “Sure.”

-

The drive back home is a little bit excruciating, for both of them, she guesses. They worked together pretty well afterwards, but this kind of feels like the walk-- drive of shame at the end of the night. 

Tony's driver drops Bruce off at Stark Tower first before taking her back to her place in Hell's Kitchen.

“So, uh, I guess I'll see you around,” Bruce says through the window of the car, blushing a little as he says it.

“Um, yeah,” she says, fiddling with her hair. “I mean, as long as Steve doesn't fall out with Tony again, we'll probably see each other sometime.”

“Well, that's no guarantee,” Bruce says, and smiles. “Have a safe trip home.”

“You too,” she says, and feels her cheeks warm when she realises that he's about ten steps from home. She clears her throat. “Bye.”

“Bye,” he echoes.

-

She has about five clear days to think about how stupid it was to bang Bruce Banner on Tony Stark's plane. Honestly it sounds like something out of an Avengers parody porno. It must have been something to do with the plane, she decides. There must have been leftover Stark pheromones in the air or something...

Early Tuesday morning though, her cell phone rings. She's tangled up in a nest of blankets, and she doesn't intend to get it, but it doesn't _stop_ ringing. She waits out the first round of _Call Me Maybe_ (maybe that was a bad choice for a ring tone...), but as soon as it rings off, it starts up again.

She crawls out of her blankets and grabs the phone. The number's unlisted; so help them if this is a cold caller... “Hello?” she says sharply.

“Hey, um, Jane?” Bruce says nervously.

“Bruce?” she says, and clears her throat.

“I'm sorry to be calling so early...” he says, and she checks the clock: 5.05am. “But, um, Steve's in the hospital, and I think that maybe you should come down here...”

“Steve?” she repeats.

“Yeah, he got hurt pretty bad. He'll be okay, but... you know, Darcy and all...”

“Yeah, uh, yeah, Jesus, I'll be there soon. Where's um, where's the hospital?”

He gives her the address and Jane splurges on a cab ride over there. It's about six in the morning when she gets there, and after she flashes her S.H.I.E.L.D. science division ID at the nurses, they let her up onto the floor, which is empty except for a dark-haired figure pacing at the other end.

“Darcy?” she calls.

Darcy starts, looking over her shoulder. “Jane? Hey...” She has a paper cup clasped in her hands, and deep bags under her eyes.

“Are you okay?” Jane asks, jogging up to her.

Darcy lifts her shoulders. “Tired. Back hurts. Hospital beds suck.”

Jane smiles a little, taking Darcy's wrist and squeezing it lightly. “How's Steve?”

Darcy looks through the window of the hospital where Steve is lying. He's asleep, or unconscious, with a couple of drips stuck in his arms. His face... he's always pale, but Jane has never seen him looking so... translucent, and his hair looks lifeless and greasy. It's... it shakes Jane a little, so see him look so vulnerable. She knew Steve was out on a mission, Darcy had called to register her complaint about their honeymoon getting cut short, but Jane never even considered that Steve wouldn't come back in one piece.

“He was in surgery for six hours last night, he took shrapnel to the gut,” Darcy says, a little tonelessly. “They're pumping him full of painkillers, he'd have OD'ed ten times over if he wasn't... Steve. But he's healing up, he's going to be fine.”

“Good, that's good,” Jane murmurs. “Are you sure you're okay, can I get you something?”

“Nah, I've got my cup of warm milk,” she says, lifting it a little.

In the hospital room, Steve starts shifting around in the bed, and Darcy zeroes in on him immediately. His hands are clutching at the blankets, and it looks like he starting to breathe harder.

“I'm gonna have to go see if he's okay,” Darcy says, “but thanks for coming over here.”

“Of course,” Jane says, giving her a quick hug. “Of course.”

Darcy hurries back into the room and leans over Steve, fussing with his hair. He stops shifting around quite so much, and his eyes flicker open slowly. Darcy grabs a jug of water off the night stand and pours out a cup of water for him. It seems like a really intensely private moment, and one that Jane's not invited to, so she waves to Darcy and heads back towards the elevator.

It sticks with her, though, that image of Steve looking so small and fragile, and she hangs around the lobby aimlessly for a little while. She feels kind of useless, being unable to help them out.

“Jane? You okay?”

She looks up and finds Bruce standing in front of her, looking concerned.

“Oh, hey, Bruce, yeah, I'm fine.” She scratches at her nose, not quite meeting his gaze.

“You sure, 'cause you don't seem okay. Did something happen with Steve?”

“No, no, he's... as fine as he can be right now, I guess. I just...” She lifts her shoulders. “It's ridiculous, I barely know Steve, but I really... I'm really shaken.”

“I don't think you have to know Steve for very long to love him,” Bruce says softly, and she guesses he's right. “You know, I thought there was a good chance that he was gonna die yesterday. Tony really... he really held it all together, got Steve through the worst of it. I was kind of amazed.”

“Hidden depths,” Jane says.

“Yeah, I guess so.” He looks to the elevators. “Is now not a good time to go up there?”

Jane shakes her head. “He was waking up, I think they need some time to themselves.”

Bruce nods. “Okay, yeah. So, um...” He pulls his fingers through his hair and tips the corner of his mouth up at her. “Do you wanna go get some coffee?”

It's not even six thirty in the morning yet, she's not sure if she should get amped on coffee so early, but Bruce is shuffling his feet a little, and she could actually do with the company.

“Sure.”

-

She wakes up at just past three in the morning, her cheek pressed against something soft and warm and a little bit... hairy. She opens her eyes slowly and looks at the expanse of back that she's resting her head on, greying curly hair brushing lightly against her forehead.

Well, shit.


End file.
